Didn't I Do Well!

When I was a child I was very tepid about having a birthday in August, all my friends were always on holiday and I never really managed to have a party. The same thing is still true, but there is a lot to be said for a summer birthday now that I am a gardener. So I was very pleased with my birthday haul this year and thought I would share it with you, not in a smug way you understand - but as a shopping aid if you need to find a present for a gardener!

There was a repeat subscription to Gardens Illustrated Magazine. Regular readers will remember me extolling the virtues of this magazine in the past and it is still the most beautiful and inspirational monthly mag out there. 

There was a very impressive (and most importantly sharp and clean - I shall be attempting to keep them that way) new pair of secateurs (Fiskars), complete with holster that can be wall mounted or clip onto your belt or pocket. I shall, therefore, henceforth only answer to the name of Quickdraw McPrune (or when I'm in the garden anyway!)

New gardening gloves (Gardman) are always good, and these ones are specially for weeding and clearing (I'm trying not to take that personally). I always struggle with garden gloves, the ones thick enough to protect you mean that you can't feel anything and then the ones that you can feel through don't offer any protection. These seem a good halfway house and are flexible and mid thickness, ideal for me (if a little pink!). My lovely Mum even tied her present up with raffia, which will be perfect for tying in in the autumn.

There was a fab selection of books, all very different which is great. Natural Garden Style (Merrell) is a beautiful book, full of pictures of drift planting, grasses and natural structures for different spaces and conditions throughout the year. It makes me want my very own prairie, and pond... and woodland! 

Lovely Carol Klein's Life in a Cottage Garden (BBC Books) takes us through the year, almost day by day, in the Glebe Cottage garden. I can see that being very useful for blog entries during quiet times of the year, and it is full of her enthusiasm and wisdom. So now I can keep up with what I've forgotten to do, as I forget it!

And then Vegetable and Fruit Growing Month by Month (KingBooks), a pretty comprehensive list of market garden crops with what they need month by month, plus info on composting, diseases, rotation and building beds. I've already discovered why my Florence Fennel was pants - spring too cold (no surprise there), and not enough water (more of a surprise given that the spring was so wet!)

In the birthday haul there were also: a wedge of garden centre vouchers (hurrah!), a lovely blue Iris (not flowering at the moment), a Thalictrum and a sweet pink Strawberry - it doesn't have fruit but does have beautiful pink flowers, blooms throughout the summer and spreads well apparently.

So I am very happy, and would recommend any of these things wholeheartedly as a gift.

Thank you to all my lovely family and friends for their generosity, now I must nip out and plant some things, prune stuff, and get reading!

Park life

On our recent trip up north, revisiting places from my youth with my long suffering Mum, we went for the morning to Calderstones Park in Liverpool. Now in my youth, Calderstones had lovely old greenhouses and a Japanese Garden to visit, but the greenhouses have now been removed and replaced with a sensory garden. Having good memories of how it used to be, I was poised to be disapproving, but I have to say the whole thing was absolutely lovely with some great herbacious borders and some gorgeous planting combinations. 
Here's edited highlights of what was there:

Beautiful Perovskia (Russian Sage) and towering Tiger Lilies 

Feathery grasses (probably a Stipa but I may be wrong), Hosters and Lavenders.

Dark Ophiopogon, red Heuchera and silvery Artemesia.

Feathery grasses and red tipped grass (Imperata cylindrica Rubra)

My favourite flowers, Astrantia and Echinacea

The Japanese Garden, a peaceful retreat.

Fantastic deep herbacious borders with globes of blue Echinops, misty yellow Solidago (Golden Rod), Orangey Ligularia, silvery Sedum, and pinky Japanese Anenome.

 There was lots of wonderful mid-summer colour, and I don't know about you, but this time of year can be a bit of a colour-lull in my garden, so now I have lots of inspiration for next year. 

Ligularia, Sedum, more Heuchera, white Echinacea and some feathery grasses are definitely on my list for next year! 

(Mind you, my list is reaching gigantic proportions - I must clear some space soon, or maybe get an allotment?!)

The wildlife was keen too!

Thanks to J + F for the wildlife shots - very talented children!

Calderstones Park

Welcome home!

You turn your back for 10 minutes (10 days actually) and look what happens! A lovely time away and I come home to 1.5kg of beans (and a slightly collapsed wigwam - I need to build stronger next year),  a row of lettuces, 200g broccoli and one 500g golden courgette- what a monster! oh and 5 mange tout - not so impressive! I can recommend having a teenager come and water for a small fee (thank you Tamsin), everything is doing well including the slugs unfortunately. Back to war - pass me the salt!

A Grand Day Out!

On a recent trip to the National Trust's Styal Mill we visited the newly restored gardens. After working our way through the fascinating Mill, full of historic working machinery and packed with information, the grounds offer a lovely contrast and look. 

Nestled in a steep valley, not far from Manchester Airport, the terraced garden has a formal garden, a walled garden and a woodland walk. Here is some of what we saw:

  

Dark Hollyhocks and Cornflowers 

My favourite - White Echinacea (plus bees!)

A lovely mix of pale green Gladioli, Allium Christophii seed heads, pale yellow Achillea 

and Astors.

  

Lilium 'Red Velvet' and purple Hemerocallis

  

Amazingly blue Hydrangeas and endlessly assorted Coreopsis

  

Eryngium 'Miss Willmott's Ghost and Echinops just waiting to burst forth.

I would recommend a trip to Styal, there is lots to do and see for all the family and plenty of space for picnics and running about. 

If you want to catch a look at what the Mill used to look like in it's heyday, it features in the Channel 4 production of The Mill, airing on Sundays at the moment. Mind you, the programme seems determined to uphold the 'It's grim up North' saying, and Styal is anything but grim now!

Recycling fun

In the Chorlton area of Manchester is a gallery that specialises in art made entirely from recycled materials, and out the back they have a tiny garden, stuffed full of ideas for the ingenious and creative junk hoarder! Here are some of the ideas I liked that they were showcasing:

Broken roof slates as a surface through which to plant Sedums, Saxifrages and other rockery plants, with bits of broken mirror addedfor extra sparkle.

Bottle bottom path through cobble stones - looked just like a winding stream.

A fake frozen pond full of shattered windscreen glass with rusty ducks skating on it. 

The waterfall was made from a glass bathroom tile.

Slates, weathered timber scraps and Saxifrages

Slate fragments - with bits and pieces attached, fossils, paint peelings, cable clamps

Old wooden tiles with paper clips/screws/can pulls etc attached. 

Perfect little works of art, and lovely en masse.

Old ladders used as the top of a pergola.

Now if you use all of these things in a small space the overall effect could be a bit junky, but take one or two bits and add it in to a conventional garden and the effect would be lovely. And all for very little money - just a visit to a good car boot sale!

Recycling is always to be encouraged - it's environmentally friendly and means you can reduce your gardens carbon footprint, and the money you save can be spent on more lovely plants!

The Big Butterfly Count is underway

Peacock Butterfly

The Big Butterfly Count started on the 20 July and continues until 11th August, so there's plenty of time for you to spend your 15 minutes butterfly spotting. That's all you have to do, sit and spot butterflies for 15 minutes and tell them what you see. 

Now if like me you are a bit rusty on identifying what you do see, then they have a downloadable ID chart, and then you can upload your results on-line. 

So if you're sitting in the sun with a cup of tea and a piece of cake (or a nice big Pimms) then keep a lookout and join in. And if you're a smartphone junkie there's even an iphone app that makes it even easier!

Small Tortoiseshell Butterfly

Click here to join in

http://www.bigbutterflycount.org